The use of dry snorkels is well known in the prior art. Specifically, dry snorkels are used by divers to keep water from entering their snorkel tubes and mouthpieces. Water that enters the snorkel tube may cause divers to take on water which may lead to choking or obstructed breathing while submerged. Additionally, when divers wish to submerge under water to explore their surroundings, they want assurance that water will not enter their snorkel tubes. If water does enter the snorkel tube and the diver is emerging from the water, he or she must blow out the water. This can be difficult if the diver has been submerged for a very long period of time. Therefore, it is desirable that a snorkel tube be designed to prohibit water from entering the air inlet end of a snorkel tube.
Additionally, a diver wants to prohibit water from entering the snorkel tube when waves are abundant. Therefore, it is desirous to utilize a snorkel design that allows the air inlet of the snorkel to remain open during normal operation, but is sealed when the snorkel tube is engulfed by water.
Various techniques have been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 2,815,751 (Ferraro), U.S. Pat. No. 2,909,959 (Girden), U.S. Pat. No. 3,141,469 (Stradella), U.S. Pat. No. 3,166,083 (Girden), U.S. Pat. No. 5,960,791 (Winefrodner et al), U.S. Pat. No. 6,994,085 (Shiue), U.S. Pat. No. 7,069,927 (Pan), U.S. Patent Application No. 20040226557 (Shiue), and Great Britain Pat. No. 457663 (Nicholson) to overcome the problems with water entering the open end of a snorkel tube. However, these disclosures suffer from one or more of the following disadvantages. First, none of these inventions include a float that pivots on a single point. Second, all of these designs are cumbersome and add to the weight and bulk of the snorkel gear. Third, none of these inventions are simple designs that are easy and relatively inexpensive to manufacture.